Forever in debt

One of the reasons I focus on college so much is that I’m contemplating how I can help my sons do well in the world.  The default option is to send my sons to college so that I can rely on professional teachers to teach them a marketable skill.

According to the U.S. Census bureau and other sources of information, having a college degree nearly doubles the person’s earning potential.  This is great news for a parent hoping to rocket boost their child’s ability to make a better life for themself.  However, what the article does not say is how much such an education would cost them.

For instance, a medical doctor may be earning over $100,000/year.  But what is left unstated is that the doctor had spent about 10 years of her life training and being educated in her field, with thousands of on-the-job hours of education, interning and residency before making a doctor’s wage.  But not only has the new M.D. spent that many years of their life training to earn such a salary, but they are saddled with a college debt that is bigger than most mortgages, payable within 15 years of the time they start working.

Taking this college inflation calculator on this site, I calculate that by the time my 4-year-old becomes 18 and is ready for college, going to my in-state alma mater would cost me and him a sum of nearly $200,000 for a basic 4-year bachelor’s degree.  The approximate rate of educational inflation is 7%.  If people are not saying that there is no “education bubble” isn’t looking at the numbers.

To send my sons off to college when they have no idea what they want to do and rely on “guidance counselors” to give them career advice is idiocy.  Worse still if I send them there to become even more generic and “well-rounded” to make them less distinguishable from the other hundreds of thousands of graduates the universities churn out each year.

As a parent, what can I do?

Unlike other technical fields like automobiles or electronics, computer programming doesn’t require expensive materials.  All it requires is a computer that you can program and the time and dedication to learn.  Today, you have so many options of what you can use for free to compile and run your programs, to practice and master your craft.  Everything from the Flex SDK, Microsoft Visual Studio Express, to JAVA blows open the doors for anyone who wants to put in the time to learn.

What computer programming represents is freedom – a way to beat everlasting slavery to your debtor.  But you have to be willing to fight for that freedom, and put in the hours to practice and learn.

Free Your Mind.